Pandemic threatens lost decade for development, UN report reveals
The highly uneven response to the pandemic has “widened the already yawning disparities and inequities within and between countries and peoples”, according to the 60 international agencies that authored the report. And while an historic $16 trillion in stimulus and recovery funds released by g…
Biden’s most important stimulus measure
The US federal government should spend more money, and fast, to fight the Covid-19 pandemic, rescue hard-hit families and help states, cities and small businesses. But it should also strive for a relief package built on some degree of bipartisan consensus. The first step to this package? Acknowledgi…
The Ethno-Territorial Separation of Bosnia Was the Key to Ending the War and Keeping Peace
As befits a successful peace agreement, the November 1995 Dayton accords that ended the Bosnian war were marked on their twenty-fifth anniversary with a flurry of international conferences. Oddly enough, even though a general acknowledgment that the accords have kept the peace, most reco…
Russia and US National Interests: Maintaining a Balance of Power in Europe and Asia
While Russia is not a superpower, it remains one of the few countries that both defines its interests in global rather than regional terms and retains limited but real global power-projection capabilities. Meanwhile, U.S. national security continues to be guided by the premise that the United S…
Joe Biden’s Ronald Reagan Problem
President-elect Joe Biden is inheriting a national crisis that has built up over 40 years. On January 20, 1981, former President Ronald Reagan took the US on a radical course when he declared in his inaugural address , “In the present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; gove…
Biden to sign executive orders rejoining Paris climate accord and rescinding travel ban on first day
President-elect Joe Biden plans to sign roughly a dozen executive orders, including rejoining the Paris climate accord and ending the travel ban on predominantly Muslim countries, on his first day in office, according to a memo from incoming chief of staff Ron Klain . F…
Sustainable Development: GOAL OF THE MONTH
Globally, the number of people living in extreme poverty declined from 36 per cent in 1990 to 10 per cent in 2015. But the pace of change is decelerating and the COVID-19 crisis risks reversing decades of progress in the fight against poverty. New research published by t…
The World China Wants
Chinese power today is a protean, dynamic force formed by the nexus of authoritarianism, consumerism, global ambitions, and technology. Call it the ACGT model: with the same initials as the nucleotides in DNA, these strands of Chinese power combine and recombine to form China’s modern political iden…
Sustainable Development: GOAL OF THE MONTH
Goal 13: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts 2019 was the second warmest year on record and the end of the warmest decade (2010- 2019) ever recorded. Carbon dioxide (CO2) levels and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere rose to new recor…
The world’s fastest-growing source of food
The green fronds that grow along much of India’s shoreline have large potential as a sustainable food source, while helping to fight climate change. Researchers in India have long been proposing seaweed cultivation as a form of sustainable agriculture. Much of India’s coast is ideal for seaweed cult…